ANA reported its consolidated half year financial results for the interim period April 1 to September 30, 2008. The Group, which consists of airlines, travel and other businesses, reported an operating income of JPY49.8 billion and a net income of JPY22 billion on revenue of JPY753 billion – falls of 25.7%, 79.1% and 1.3% respectively – against a background of declining passenger numbers. Net income, in the same period in the previous year, had been boosted beyond normal levels by an extraordinary gain on the sale of ANA’s hotel properties.
ANA executive vice president Finance, Tomohiro Hidema, said of the Group’s performance: “These midterm results reflect the challenging operating environment in which we find ourselves. Beyond the price of oil, which hit historic highs and sent our fuel bill soaring for most of the period under review, we are faced at home with softening overall demand and increased competition from other airlines and the railways. These elements, coupled with our own cuts in capacity, have meant that revenue on our domestic operation was down year-on-year. On the international front, however, despite the shadow cast by the global recession on business travel demand on our North American routes in the first instance, and latterly on our European routes, and a drop in demand for travel in general to China, revenue was up on last year, buoyed in part by growth in the intra-Asia cargo market.
